The Cost Of Friendship

Human friendship is so intertwined and interconnected and complicated. It can make life bearable, or amazing, or ecstatic. Having those special people to share life with is a blessing no human should go without. It's a part of the human experience that gives it a sense of meaning. But... it involves a lot of hard work to maintain.

A friendship requires constant contact. This is to I once had required me to get a second phone to be able to contact her when I needed to and avoid high charges for overseas calls and texts. I wanted to keep in contact with her but to do that I had to get a new number with a new provider to be able to contact her. Sounds expensive? It was. But I felt it was worth it to build a friendship I placed a high value on.

When you place value on a friendship it requires a sacrifice. Sometimes doing things that you don't like doing just because it means spending time with someone to add to your life or to add to their life or both investing and adding to each others lives. Sometimes it might mean traveling across this great planet just to be by their side to help them celebrate a victory or mourn a loss or just to be with them. Sometimes it requires watching a soppy romantic love story on television when all you want to do is go and watch a gory blood fest at the movies.

It is a strange thing to have friends. You can't live with them, you can't live without them. It brings a bond that creates life and hope. But when it breaks it can cause heartbreak and destroys bonds all around it.

Recently I had such an experience where a friendship came to an end due to a difference in definitions. To them friendship just meant minimal contact and a deliberate removal of personal information from all communication. To me this seemed more like the definition of an acquaintance so we decided it best we go our separate ways.

It's not till now (4 weeks later) that I have come to realize the implications of this one friendship. Some of my closest friends have had to split their time between the two of us due to their commitment to both. I have also had to voluntarily break contact with several other friends who I had shared many an experience with due to the fact they were very close to her and her family. I still find myself checking my phone for that random text message I used to get for 3 whole years but none comes.

friendship is important. It is good to cultivate such close bonds because we cannot live our lives with just the ones we barely know. But we need to always remember that with friendship, there is ALWAYS a cost.

If you DON'T have friends, you don't have someone to share life with, no-one to speak to about life's struggles, no-one to enjoy life's victories. I guess that's why in this friendless society, psychologists and psychiatrists are so popular(?).

If you DO have friends, you have someone to share life with but sometimes you have to do things you don't personally enjoy because you want to spend time with that person. You may even suffer through a lecture about healthy eating because they are passionate about it and you are not (as much). But then who knows, you may learn a thing or two. :D

If the friendship breaks apart the cost is the widespread destruction that one broken friendship can cause. The other friendships that are compromised, the memories that are destroyed, the hopes and dreams that are given up on.

Here's what I am saying. Whatever you decide about the friendships you have, keep being great friends to the ones you have, make news ones every chance you get, BUT.....always remember THERE IS ALWAYS A COST.